ACØPR, ham radio blog: True test of the QCX Mini on Monument Peak, Iron Co. (ATNO)

My last activation I had a backup radio and antenna, this time it was the QCX Mini and the 20m dipole I made for it or bust. This was a far-out summit--two hours before even starting the hike portion and an All-Time-New-One (ATNO) for SOTA, Monument PeakW7U/IR-045 (4 pointer).

In the area:

I first noticed this one years ago when I was at a butte that was a 2-pointer (Blue Knoll) and could see this summit. It was far enough out in the middle of nowhere that I didn't know if I would ever get back to it. Miles and miles of dirt roads. Luckily, from the peakbagger website, I saw a route I hadn't noticed before and it was going to be much better as far as steepness and safety. Still way out, not much over 800' vertical feet.

Getting to the base to start the hike was tougher than expected. Sometimes both the older topo maps as well as Google maps show roads that barely count as roads. It wasn't bad until about the last two miles (and this was on the ATV). It obviously hadn't been used in years plus because of a fire in the past, a lot of land work was done by some heavy equipment and they didn't take the road into account really. rocks and dead trees everywhere. It wasn't purposefully blocked and no signs, just neglected. It was growing over enough with grass that I started to get concerned about starting a fire. Luckily the pans on the newer ATV's are a hard plastic and don't spark.

I finally got close enough to start to hike (still not as far as I thought I could get). It's the kind of hike I like. Very open so you can see where you're going and plan the route as you look at the mountain. It was grassy but also very rocky under that. No overly steep parts (didn't have to scramble with hands at any point) and no bush whacking. Even with back planning, because of the hard last couple of miles of road plus hiking a little farther than planned, I made it to the summit after the time I had posted to be on the air. I took some pictures first anyway and was excited to have summited.

On the radio:

Setup was fairly fast. I used all the length of twine on the ends of my dipole to tie down to rocks on the

ground. My new coax is 15' (purposefully) and so my fishing pole mast uses all but the last section. I got everything hooked up and ready to record. When I powered up and got near the frequencies I use, I heard quite a few people on--another contest it seems. I didn't have to go far to find an open freq though--14.061. There was cell phone coverage on the summit so I spotted myself (which worked great this time thankfully!), and started calling CQ. I got calls quickly with Bob, AC1Z, in New Hampshire being my second call. A great sign getting all the way to NH early on.

I was getting a little from all over, TN, MT (which is close), NC, FL and they were coming pretty quickly. I did get QRM from the contesters--always an issue being QRP is getting stomped on. The

QCX Mini and the dipole were doing very well for me so I was plenty happy. After 10 minutes on air, I had 11 contacts. I called a few more times, but no answer. I checked the spotter to see if someone was on 20m I could get a summit-to-summit with, but most everyone was on SSB (voice), I imagine because of the contest. I do generally stay on longer, but with a contest on and not having other bands available, I just called it and took some more pictures. I was behind time-wise and wanted to take my time going back down to be safe. In the future I think I'll need to build a 40m radio as well just for those other chasers who are closer. It was fun, I had gotten a new summit, successful, beautiful day--doesn't get much better.

Video of the activation

Time	Callsign	Band	Mode
15:37	VE2PID/W4	14MHz	CW
15:37	AC1Z	14MHz	CW
15:38	NE4TN	14MHz	CW
15:39	KR7Q	14MHz	CW
15:40	K4MF	14MHz	CW
15:40	K6MW	14MHz	CW
15:40	N0RZ	14MHz	CW
15:41	W4KAC	14MHz	CW
15:42	KU4R	14MHz	CW
15:43	WB2FUV	14MHz	CW
15:45	KF9D	14MHz	CW